and can give us a description of the car.”
Her words electrocute my heart, sending it into a panicked dance. “Oh my God. Oh my God.” I press my free hand to my mouth and try not to throw up.
“I need you to start thinking of the people you know both a little and a lot, okay? People you run into during a normal day. People who might be looking for more time with Ethan. The vast majority of children are taken by someone who knows them somehow.” She pauses, and I know from her expression, from the way her mouth straightens out and tightens, what’s coming next. “I need you to tell me about Andrew.”
Her words make me dizzy. My soon-to-be ex-husband. The man who once told me he would love me forever. Who brought me lunch at work and flowers just because. Who even in our worst moments could always make me laugh. And now these people are suggesting he might be behind this? I’m as repulsed by the idea as I am tempted to believe it. At least if Ethan were with Andrew, he’d be safe. Andrew wouldn’t hurt him.
But pushing up through all the chatter are two questions I can’t escape, no matter how hard I try to smother them.
Where is Andrew?
Why isn’t he answering his door?
5 hours, 13 minutes missing
I pause on the top step, listening to the voices drifting across the foyer downstairs, trying to identify them. My husband’s, deep and powerful. A male voice I don’t recognize. A softer, higher tone that can only belong to a female.
I turn around and head back up.
People who don’t know me, those who see me trailing Sam around town to openings and fancy fund-raisers, assume that Sam chose me because I’m arm candy. A pretty little wife selected for her sample-sized figure and red-carpet smile, curated with the sole purpose of elevating the mayor’s standing. I’m supposed to cheer him on, champion his causes, boost his popularity, hike up his poll numbers.
Yes, I look good on his arm, but most people don’t know I once had dreams and plans that had nothing to do with Sam. A master’s in Art History from Columbia, a love of all things French, a holy grail goal of one day working at the Louvre. People don’t know this about me because they don’t ask, and sometimes, I get so caught up in this life as the mayor’s wife that I forget it myself. Dreams don’t die as much as they fade into the background.
Sam and I met at the tail end of grad school, when I was here for a monthlong internship at the High Museum. My mother had just moved to town, and I was staying with her, sleeping on her pullout couch and pounding away at my thesis, the visual hagiography of St. Margaret of Antioch in thirteenth-century stained glass. I was biding my time here, a quick pit stop on my road to Paris.
And then I met Sam.
It happened at a Falcons game, where my father had dragged me to a VIP suite high above the field. Dad was a busy, busy man. If he could knock out a business deal while also celebrating his daughter’s thirtieth year on the planet, the night was a win-win for everybody—except me.
Just after halftime, I felt someone sink into the seat behind me.
“It’d sure be nice if the D could get some stops during garbage time instead of letting the other team run their asses ragged.” He leaned forward in the plush chair, pointing over my shoulder with his long arm. “We thought we had a blowout on our hands, see, so the Falcons sent in the second-string team. But being too cocky is never a good thing. Makes you sloppy. The defense is paying for it now.”
My answer was an uninterested hum. I’m not a football fan, have never understood the appeal of grown men fighting over a piece of leather and air.
He didn’t take the hint. He reached his arm around to offer a hand. “Sam Huntington.”
I hadn’t been in Atlanta long, but even I knew who Sam Huntington was. Old Atlanta royalty and rising political star, the youngest deputy attorney general ever appointed in Atlanta, a city that bore his last name on more than one street sign. Sam’s great-great-grandfather thought Atlanta might be a good spot for a railway terminus, and the long line of Huntingtons have been profiting from his vision ever since.
But there was his hand and I had no other choice but to shake it. He had a warm, firm grip. A politician’s grip. The grip of a guy who would go far.
“Stefanie Lawrence.”
“Nice to meet you, Stefanie Lawrence. I take it you’re not a fan.”
“I couldn’t care less about football,” I said, turning back to the field.
“I meant of me.” I looked at him in surprise, and he grinned. “Reading people is my superpower. A necessary one in my line of work, but still. People tell me I’m pretty good at it. Right now, it’s telling me you wish I’d go away so you can finish pretending to watch the game.” He reclined in his chair, sweeping an arm over the back of the empty seat next to him. “So? How’d I do?”
I couldn’t help but smile. “Who’s cocky now?”
Sam laughed.
“And for the record, I’m not not a fan. I’m just...I don’t know, trying to make it through the game, I guess.”
“Still. I’d prefer you were a fan.”
“Surely you don’t need another.” My tone was teasing but firm. Looks and money and the Huntington name—of course I could see the appeal. But the combination was too heady, too dangerous for someone on her way out of town. With a polite smile, I turned back to the game.
“All right, fine. I can take a hint. I’ll leave you alone, but only if you tell me something about you.” He leaned far forward, his head coming flush to mine. “I don’t care what.”
I gave him a sidelong look. “One thing?”
He lifted a single finger. “Just one. And then I’ll clear out, I promise.”
I could have told him about the discovery I’d uncovered in my research, that the depictions of Margaret in the cathedral of Chartres were tailored to each window’s location in the church and the surrounding imagery. I could have told him I missed my friends, my Manhattan apartment, that sidewalk café on Columbus Avenue where they make the most perfect macchiato. What came out surprised even me: “Today’s my birthday.”
Sam looked disappointed. “I guess I should have qualified that with the word truth. Tell me something about you that’s true.”
“It is true.” His frown didn’t clear, so I added, “Do you want to see my driver’s license?”
“Why would you spend your birthday watching a sport you just told me you hated?”
“I do hate it. My father, however—” I pointed over his shoulder, to where my father was talking to a man so tall he could only have been a basketball player “—does not.”
Sam smiled, but the gesture looked a little sad. “Well, now, that is a goddamn shame.” He unfolded his long body from the chair, leaning in to whisper in my ear, “Happy birthday, Steffi. I hope you get everything you could ever wish for.”
The tears were pretty much instant, though I didn’t let Sam see. At the time, I blamed them on homesickness and hormones and hearing the sound of my nickname in a strange city, rolling off a stranger’s tongue, but the truth was, it had been a shitty birthday. My best friends were thousands of miles away. My mother was pissed I was spending the day with my father, whom I rarely saw and who had flown in for the occasion. My father had brought me to the last place on earth I wanted to be, and was now too busy schmoozing the bigwigs to pay me much attention. So far that day, neither of my parents had wished me a happy birthday. Sam’s words hit me like an unexpected gift.
He surprised me again two days later, when he showed up at the High with